Hamilton Joins Global Day of Action on Climate Change

In the last eight years, the city has endured 17 rain storms severe enough to flood homes, at least six of which appear to have exceeded the once-in-50-year standard, including a100-year-plus deluge in July 2009 that damaged over 7000 homes and caused up to $300 million in insured losses alone. ...

[I]n addition to insured and uninsured costs to flooded residents, the 2009 downpour imposed an estimated $14 million in damages to municipally-owned properties including the Red Hill Parkway. And for all but one of the 17 storms, compassionate grants of $750 to $1000 have been issued to flooded residents - payouts that have now exceeded $5 million.

Trying to make Hamilton's infrastructure more resilient to climate change has eaten up a further $341 million since 2004 including what's budgeted to the end of 2014. The 2005-2009 period saw storm-related spending of $118.2 million, while that has nearly doubled in the subsequent five year budget to $223.7 million.

This Saturday, Hamilton350 is organizing a demonstration at the corner of King and James as part of a global day of action on climate change. Called 'Connect the Dots', the event seeks to highlight the link between the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events and global climate change.

Participants are asked to bring a black umbrella to represent the escalating public and private cost of climate change in Hamilton. The global 350.org climate change action group has released a video, titled "Things Happen", to promote the Connect the Dots campaign worldwide:

This coming Thursday morning, a group of local organizations including Hamilton 350, the Hamilton Conservation Authority, Environment Hamilton, Green Venture, the Council of Canadians - Hamilton Chapter, the City and the McMaster Centre for Climate Change are hosting a media conference on climate change in Hamilton to "provide information on the noteworthy effects of climate change already evident in the Hamilton area".

Update: be sure to check out part two of the CATCH report, which delves much more deeply into the financial costs of the 17 severe storms Hamilton has weathered in the past eight years.

Hey Kiely, I agree, once again the capitalist gives no real thought into their comment. People like the capitalist are lacking in skills relevant to critical thinking, they cannot even grasp the idea that CAPITALISM is wrong for many, many reasons.

I've seen melting glaciers in the Alps first-hand. I saw New Orleans after the storm. How long are we going to keep denying the obvious?

With well over $200 million run up in unexpected costs of bad weather locally, this is already having a pretty serious impact. There's a lot of parts of the city where people can no longer get insurance. And that's just Hamilton. How much worse does this have to get before we acknowledge the obvious?

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century."
— Lewis Mumford

Hey Alex, when I bumped into you the other day in the alley you didn't even introduce me to your partner and baby. What's up with that buddy?

How much worse does this have to get before we acknowledge the obvious?

The climate change we are experiencing is a direct result of soil mineral depletion and a natural occurrence (there have been 5 in the last million or so years) as we move from the interglacial (current epoch) into the glacial (next ice age). Warmer mid-latitude temperatures move atmospheric moisture to the poles which precipitate as snow. Eventually the albedo affect of snow-pack will lower earth's temperature which leads to more snow-pack and growing glaciers. Glaciation is the means by which the earth remineralizes the soils from which all life depends for good health. The planet is sick or in other words, the earth has gotten a cold and what we are experiencing are hot flashes.

The CATCH editor and the Hamilton 350 group are seriously misguided in their efforts to con-front this climate change phenomenon. There is only one way to prevent the coming ice age and that is with a massive global soil remineralization project, nothing else will have any affect. Mankind has accelerated our move into glaciation by perhaps a few hundred years but our burning of fossil fuels cannot even begin to compare with the pollution levels of burning boreal forests and volcanism's perilous dearth that is verily upon us.

GAIA has begun to remineralize because we have not done IT yet. Unfortunately, her methods are very unpleasant.

Sorry 'bout the alley, we were in a hurry. And wasn't my partner, just an old friend.

As for soils, it's now clear that they're as large a source of carbon emissions as industry. Careless tilling or exposure to sunlight causes the humus (carbon) in soils to break down and offgas, which not only pumps the atmosphere full of CO2 and methane, but also seriously depletes their ability to grow things.

A serious effort at sequestering carbon in our topsoils could take our atmosphere back down to levels seen around the beginning of the industrial revolution, not to mention doing wonders for farmland.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century."
— Lewis Mumford

As for soils, it's now clear that they're as large a source of carbon emissions as industry. Careless tilling or exposure to sunlight causes the humus (carbon) in soils to break down and offgas, which not only pumps the atmosphere full of CO2 and methane, but also seriously depletes their ability to grow things.

Humus is actually dead skins of the soil's microorganisms and not correctly identified as strictly carbon. Although I totally agree with regards to careless tilling and over exposure of agricultural soil, you make no mention of our existing and diminishing forests and their condition. Nobody wants to talk about "acid rain" anymore, you'd think IT just went away. The truth is the rain is like vinegar with a dash of Fukushima nowadays. The acids in the rain have leached most of the essential trace minerals from the soil that both plants and animals depend on for healthy vigorous growth. A lack of minerals is what seriously depletes the soil's ability to grow things.

A serious effort at sequestering carbon in our topsoil's could take our atmosphere back down to levels seen around the beginning of the industrial revolution, not to mention doing wonders for farmland.

I cannot agree more Undustrial Alex. The problem is that a mineral deficient soil produces weak and spindly, mineral deficient animals and plants. We must feed the microorganisms in the soil first because they provide the nutrients (humus) that plants digest and in turn, through their fruits and vegetables, that animals and humans ingest.

A sick soil will not sequester sufficient amounts of carbon in the plants (trees) grown therein. Only a healthy soil can reproduce Eden. Which is why I hammer rocks into powder and then sprinkle them in my garden. I don't have time to wait for glacial soil restoration, which takes 90,000 years to complete, once IT begins.

PS - I wish to acknowledge my non-supporters at St Joe's, HHS's and others whom I won't mention (because I've done the research just in case you were wonderin') for their continued childish propensity for down-voting my nutritional commentary. Clicking on an arrow is kinda cowardly and IT is a pity they are too blind to see the plain and simple truth I try to share, to improve the health of my city, because I truly care.